Third Person POV: A Personal and A Bird's Eye Approach

Hello, friends! Today, I’m going to talk about point of view yet again, particularly third person POV omniscient. This is a great one, even though it should be carefully handled. Unlike third person limited or first person, it provides a larger scope for the readers. The world feels bigger because there are many angles. It is very common in books today, and in my opinion, there are two subgroups of third person omniscient. I will call one the “bird’s eye view” and the other the “personal view.”

The bird’s eye view style, for example, is in A Tale of Two Cities by Charles Dickens. Although Dickens goes into the heads of the characters, he often steps back as an outsider and depicts the events unfolding without even having the angle of a specific character. This perspective is very effective to show the scope of what is happening in London and Paris, and the many points of view surrounding the French Revolution. It is almost like a movie in some places, because the reader feels like he or she is watching the characters from the outside rather than looking through the eyes of a character. Personally, I think that this point of view feels impersonal and difficult to get into at times because there are so many POV’s and not a lot of intimacy with one or a few characters. However, the benefit of this angle is the scenes that build suspense and mystery because the narrator is more of an outsider showing how this grand story unfolds. This method makes it much easier to jump around in the plot and tell a large, complex story. This style can also be very poetic because the author can step back and see how beautiful or how deranged a situation is without the bias of one person’s POV. In Book Two, Chapter 7 of A Tale of Two Cities, I remember one scene where a child was killed in the street because of a carriage, and Dickens looks from the outside, watching the appalling indifference of the rich man in the carriage contrasted with the wild anguish of a poor man. This scene is incredibly powerful and its power is intensified because Dickens makes the reader feel as if he or she is watching this scene unfold.

The personal third person omniscient is like third person limited, except that it is more intimate with two or more characters rather than just one. Whenever it cuts to a person’s point of view, it feels like you are getting into their head, not just weaving in and out through perspectives. This POV has the advantage of putting right in the head of a character, making it easier to relate to the story, just like first person or third person limited. But this POV style is different because it gets in the head of one person and then takes the reader to another person. This can add a whole new dimension to the story. One example is Easy Target by Tim Shoemaker. Shoemaker mostly follows Hudson as the main character, along with Maggie, Pancake (that’s his nickname), and Giovanna, who are kids in Southfield Middle School. Maggie and Pancake are friends, and Maggie used to be best friends with Giovanna until Giovanna became one of the girl bullies at school. At first, you see how Hudson joins Maggie and Pancake and is going to fight for his new friends against bullies like Wolf, Kat and Giovanna. You later see Maggie’s POV, a lonely girl who struggles with being bullied by her old best friend. It is very easy to take the side of these three likable kids, who are fighting the bullies. We know who the good guys are and who the bad guys are, right?

But then you see Giovanna’s POV. With this one added POV, the world suddenly gets bigger. The struggle against the antagonists gets a lot more complicated. Giovanna is more than just a bully, but a girl with a lot of problems and a girl that is struggling to cope with her own loneliness. The world isn’t quite black and white anymore, and the question arises: is Hudson hurting more than he is helping? I won’t spoil the ending, so go read it and see how it ends. But if you are going to use Third Person Omniscient in this personal way, try to find a way to contrast characters in their worldviews or ways of thinking so that it creates a richer tapestry for the characters.

So, if you feel that you want to use Third POV omniscient, be careful with how you go about it. You don’t want to overwhelm the reader with too many POV’s if you can help it. I loved Easy Target, but four is a lot for the personal kind of approach. It’s a lot easier on the reader to go with fewer, and it also gives more depth to the specific characters you are choosing. In the bird’s eye view, it is more common to jump around to lots of people, but don’t overcomplicate it. If you can stick with fewer people, do that.

Finally, ask yourself if or how the book would be best with one of these two approaches. If you seem to be needing so many character points of view to weave this tapestry of amazing story, then maybe the bird’s eye view would work great. If you want to be personal, ask yourself if the story would be better with third person limited or third person omniscient. Sometimes, like in my previous post on Til We Have Faces, one POV is absolutely golden. But if you are using Third Person omniscient, experiment with watching the main character from another character’s perspective. This may add another layer of understanding to your protagonist and it can complicate things if another character questions his or her actions, making you question if he or she is right.

Now, think about your favorite books and how they use POV’s. And then go write some good stories! Make a difference in the world! Love people through story!

And just keep writing.

~Evelyn Knight